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On Our Radar: Green Tuesday at the White House

Steve Pope/European Pressphoto AgencyPresident Obama at a campaign rally on the campus of Iowa State University.

On Tuesday it was environmental news day for the Obama administration.

First, the announcement that by 2025 cars and light trucks must meet the equivalent of a 54.5-miles-per-gallon standard, doubling the fleet’s current fuel efficiency. [CBS News]

Then the president took a moment to discuss the problem of greenhouse gases, something he has done less frequently of late. In a speech at Iowa State University, he noted that “We’re on track to emit fewer greenhouse gases this year than we have in nearly 20 years.” He did not note the role of the recession, with its attendant drop in manufacturing and car and truck trips. [White House Press Office]

Elsewhere, Sean Lennon, son of John Lennon and Yoko Ono, took to The New York Times op-ed page to publish a plea against fracking. [The New York Times]

Two campers have died and 1,700 more who stayed at Yosemite National Park may have been exposed to the rodent-carried hantavirus. It can take as much as six weeks after infection for flulike symptoms to develop.The virus is fatal in 30 percent of all cases. [Associated Press]

The scientific journal Geophysical Research Letters and some sister publications have collected and put online all the papers concerning the March 2011 Japanese earthquake and tsunami. [Geophysical Research Letters]

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How are climate change, scarcer resources, population growth and other challenges reshaping society? From science to business to politics to living, our reporters track the high-stakes pursuit of a greener globe in a dialogue with experts and readers.